Peacekeeper
by ZhouYuII
Summary: Lt. Joseph Malory has been in the T'au force for two years now. Established to protect and extract mutants in danger of being overtaken by mobs and hostile crowds, the T'au are playing an increasingly important yet controversial role in America.


Copyright: I don't own X-men, the Tau, the U.S. armed forces or anything like that. This story is about combat and the experiences along with it. There will be language, though the F-bomb will probably never be dropped (and when it is, it will be censored and implied). I have a good friend and a cousin in the military, along with a grandfather who served, not having served myself (a recruiter once laughed at me when I asked about joining up (and I take it in good humor ) )). Therefore, anyone who knows anything about military combat procedures that I miss or write about incorrectly, please let me know about them in review. I'll attempt corrections within context of the story (I.E. if it changes the plot, I probably won't change it). Take care and enjoy! (First story on Fanfic for the win!)

**PeaceKeeper**

Chapter 1: In the Beginning, There Was the Big Bang

Another apartment. Lord, I_ hate _apartments. Rooms on every side of the halls, no windows to check the outdoor situations. And on top of it all, the numbers on all the doors here are worn out. It's the kind of building you wouldn't take money to live in. And my squad is supposed to get the kid to the open sky in nineteen minutes. Nineteen minutes to fight our way up twelve flights of stairs against a mob of anti-mutant fanatics in the middle of NYC. God, I hate apartments.

The name's Malory. Joseph Malory. Joe Mo to my men. I'm in charge of Second Squad of the third platoon of the T'au Peacekeepers. Don't ask me where the name came from right now. I'm a little busy.

Mary's pulse rifle sounds off at the rear of the squad. The monsters are catching up. I lean over the stair railing to look down. There must be over two-hundred of them. Half have small arms. Henry, George and Kathy have the girl surrounded and are using their power armor to shield her from the bullets. I have point. Eleven stories to go.

My HUD (Heads Up Display) inside my visor kicks in as the lights go out. The monsters think they can get us to trip over ourselves. Their loss. Our HUDs have night-vision. Only the girl is in the dark, and she's got her own way of making light. According to the Xavier school, her name's Rosette Collins. The reason this little blondie warrants the mob? She can make her bones glow through her skin. Not an impressive power, I know, but I'm a simple man. I go where I'm told, when I'm told. I owe the doc that much for all the work he did to me.

Seven stories to go and Mary's face shows up in my HUD. She needs one of us to come back and help her. I look over the railing. The mob's tripping over itself, but they somehow made it to one storey below us. George breaks the cover on Rosette and goes to back her up. Someone from below chucks a molotov up to me. The suit's thermal systems break into effect. Out goes the flame as I raise my left fist. Out sprays the fire extinguisher. I swear to God, the doc put more junk in this suit than the stuff in a swiss-army-knife. First time I had to use the bloody thing in a year with this outfit.

I hear a sharp crack above me. Nuts. The monkeys took the elevators. There's three ahead of us. One has a B.A.R. Not good. The man looks like he could pass as one of those crazed militiamen on T.V. decked out in ammo, camo and guns. I raise my pulse rifle, but he's already got a bead on me.

Let me tell you, even with the doc's suit the thing stings like no other. In no time he's got me pinned against the wall, pumping more metal into me than has any business. He's going for the chest and head, where my armor's strongest. If he hits the arms, I'm out. Game over. Strike three.

Henry sets his rifle to kill. I get the pleasure of hearing Iron Maiden blare through my ears as his sound blasts break bones, shatter metal bullets, and cave in the crazy's head. The B.A.R. is useless now. Henry probly just did the next to worst thing possible, other than killing our Charge. The newsies always side with the crowds. Especially where us and bodies are concerned.

No time to lose. I'm on my feet in seconds, my prosthetic legs giving me all the jump I need. The spent bullets fall out of my armor, a few marks staining it. Time to do this the quick way.

"One to all. Jump. I say again, Jump."

Not a good tactical idea in a stairwell, but now speed is of the essence. The guardrail gave us nice cover; now we have to risk the fall. George and Henry take the girl and start to kick up dust. Those of us without prosthetic legs use the short range jump-jets in our armor. Most they're good for is five seconds of lift per jump before they lose juice.

Top level in five minutes. Mary's covering our back. Henry, George and I kick down the door, following sweep-and-clear procedure. Kathy watches after Rosette. Roof's clean.

"One to pickup, I need extraction."

"Pickup, one. Extraction in four. Newsies got their choppers everywhere."

"Extraction, now means _now_. _Five-minutes-ago _now. We ran into heavies in the stairway. Double-time it if you can."

"One, acknowledged. Will do everything we can."

The crowd catches up just as the Hammerhead dropship comes into sight. I have Henry take Rosette to the center of the roof for first pickup. The roof won't support the 'head's weight long enough to get us all. He'll have to jump her up. The rest of us lay down suppressing fire through the door, establishing a free-fire zone. Anything that moves, we suppress. Iron Maiden gives way to Beethoven. Our rifles are giving out sound pulses that smart like rubber bullets again.

Just as the 'head gets in range, the crowd makes a rush. They know it's do or die. They either get their mutant body now, or they get to go to their hospitals and doctors knowing they got the bad end of the deal.

Henry buzzes into our HUDs. The 'head dropped its ramp, hovering a few feet above the roof, and he's onboard with the girl. I take point while we make a fighting retreat. Once the mob clears the door we're done for. They get their numerical advantage and we get our asses handed to us. We've walked backwards halfway to the 'head when they break out. Now we get to exercise.

We run up the ramp and into our seats. Rosette's strapped in next to Henry, crying up a storm. The kids always cry. Sometimes the older ones do too.

The 'head takes off and we're streaming through NYC faster than a bat out of Hell. Sometimes I wonder if the devil himself would even wanna be in some of our positions. Odds are almost always against us. Not as bad as they were for Henry in 'Nam when he lost his arm, but still pretty bad.

All the newsies probly have their cameras on us right now. After all, how often do you get to see a pulse-driven vehicle in action. I know the government and Big Three have been in talks to get their hands on the patent and blueprints, but the doc still won't give 'em out. Just like most of the stuff he makes.

The Hammerhead is pretty simple in design. Four sound-powered pulse engines attached at the four corners of the rectangular body. Four landing legs. Two ramps on either side for quick deployment. One box-tight cockpit for pilot, copilot and engineer. The engine is pretty simple. Just one stereo blasting Iron Maiden, Black Sabbath, Dragonforce, and every God-awful screaming song you've ever heard, continuously. The sound moves through the engine and, through some of the doc's technosorcery, powers the pulse generators. Thankfully, the stereo is in one of them soundproof glasses to give us some quiet time.

At this point, all the helmets are off. The T-shaped visors and yellow plates give way to make us human again. Henry's dyed green hair looks ridiculous with his marine haircut. Kathy still opts for her natural red, despite how Henry keeps telling her to change its color to purple. George and I could be brothers. His black and my dark-brown look too close for comfort. Mary, the only black person I know to dye their hair platinum, is giving her inhaler a few puffs. She arguably went through the most, keeping the crowd off us.

"Good trigger finger, Mary." It's the truth, not some b.s. encouragement like they give us all at the firing ranges.

"I'm sorry sir. I blew out two of their knees. I even got one in the eye." Mary hates to kick ass and take names. Probly because she was always in supply convoys instead of the crap we all had to face. War was a bunch of charts and figures for her until she got her convoy lost and wacked in the desert.

"Were they armed?" George asks.

"Every last one of 'em." She remembers them clearly. Her confidence doesn't waver. I can't remember the crazy's hair color that Henry blew away, and the man near coulda' blown my arms off.

"Their loss," I say. "They had bullets, you had sound. We made the warning broadcast when we started to get our asses in motion for evac. It was their loss."

"Damn straight," Henry butts in.

My attention turns from Mary to more pressing matters.

"Henry, I appreciate the save back there. But you do know the rules right? I ordered minimal force. I mean, things happen and you did what you did to help me. Three bodies, three letters, three hand-delivered checks. And I don't care what the doc says 'bout charity, I'm gonna make you work off every cent of that three-hundred-kay."

"Understood sir. I take full responsibility."

I do appreciate the save. When it's between me and them, I got a mission to complete, whereas the crazies always go for the kids. I'll waste a hundred of 'em to keep the kid living, mutie or no.

Rosette's still crying up a storm. The Hammerhead hits the thrusters as we clear NYC. Time to RTB. That's Return to Base for everyone else out there. The squad business done, we all turn to Rosette. She's giving off more light as she gets more upset. The more upset she gets, the more light she lets off. We put our visors back on to shield our eyes.

"Rosette, my name is Lieutenant Joseph Malory of the T'au Peacekeepers. At this time we are headed to the T'au compound under the leadership of Mr. Anderson Fanjick. When we arrive, you'll be given food and shelter. You will also be given the right to make one of two decisions. Either accept a free admission to Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters a few miles from the compound, or establish contact with a family member who is willing to shelter you. If said family member cannot pick you up, we will provide transportation for you to this family member."

"Dad... he started the whole thing." She's coming under control now. Still crying, but not as hard. We can take our visors off soon. "When he found out about me, he called his friends together. He started the crowd."

Dumb bastard. Nine times out of ten, it's the parents who go after their kids when the mutations occur. In two years of service with the T'au, I've never had an extraction where the parents want to help the kid. We got dropped at the ground floor as the crowd formed outside, went in from the opposite side to avoid detection, found Rosette's room, and got her out. It all went nice and smooth until the stairwell.

In a half hour, we'll be at the compound and Rosette can make her choice.

I've already made mine.

Four years in the army and two legs later, I was on the streets, doing enough drugs to make a rock star look sober. Then I hear about the doc. He's a mutie inventor. You probly haven't heard of him. Got a nice power though. He can store any object he desires into data with the touch of his hand, then make it reappear whenever and wherever he wants. I'll get into his background another time.

Just as the mutie rage starts up, he's got this bright idea. Most of the police won't do much in helping out muties on the run from mobs. So he uses his inventions to establish a new organization. He starts offering prosthetic arms and legs to veterans like me, down on their luck and in worse habits. When I hear about free legs, I jump in my shopping cart and start wheeling my way across the state to get in line. All the guys and gals in line are in my position too. Free legs, arms and eyes in exchange for a purpose in life? We were all over it.

God, if I only knew what I was in for, I might have had second thoughts...


End file.
